Andy joined Dec 10, 2006

Scotch and Coffee founder, level designer, texture artist, model editor and voice actor. I'm always up for a voice acting job and will gladly do any lines you want to send to me. Also, I enjoy making video reviews for mods for Half-Life and Half-Life 2, so let me know if you want me to review one and I'll fit it in when I can.

"When I say a realism mod, I'm speaking in terms that most people seem to on moddb. The people who think adding ironsights to any game like Half-Life or CounterStrike makes it realistic."

A moderate amount of people like that. It caters to them, yes theres way to many realism mods out there and yes many are not good enough to be worth using. But a select few are used by a fair bit of people. I guess this seems more like a cry out to modders to be more original.

Its not just ironsights, but also lean keys, realistic weapon names/models, you take more damage, faster/smarter enemies, headshots are one one kill (CS although allowed for surviving more than one headshot with low calibre weapons if you bought a helmet), and various minor changes.

"In a realistic FPS, you'd take a shot to the leg, lose control of your player character while he rolls around on the ground before finally falling unconscious and bleeding out

You'd get one life and if you died the game would self destruct and you'd never get to play it again."

but we don't equate "realism" with "ultra realism". All that stuff you say has no bearing on what we come to define as realism in shooters.

Ultra realism is close to the first point you made and its not as popular, and rarely is it seen in mods.
*Getting shot once and dying.
*Sluggish movement.
*Maps of the area.
*Pre-planning stages.
*Minor real-time tactic elements like squad commands.
*Use of vehicles, traps, & alternate grenades rather than just the standard frags.
*Avoiding the killing of innocents/hostages otherwise failing the mission.
*Being able to take out "leaders" (bosses) with one shot (other types of games never do this).
*NPC Team mates stay dead and are replaced with new guys on the next mission.
*In multiplayer you stay dead until a new map is started (although Ultra Realism games started this, counter-strike has borrowed this and many other standard realism games have as well.. even TF2 with its Arena mode).

There are games that have done Ultra Realism. Red Orchestra 1-2, Operation Flashpoint and Ghost Recon (not just ARMA). The games that followed semi-closely to that list is RB6 1-3, SWAT 3-4 and Delta Force (although they allowed you to take 2-3 bullets before dying).

Newer Rainbow Six/Ghost Recon games have taken a more action/semi-realism route. Maybe this is why people who are starved for tactical shooters ask for realism mods when in fact what they crave is Ultra Realism/tactical mods.

I don't agree with this tips. A realist game or mod can be great.
The thing is: Don't make a game according to a principle, but do it for the gameplay, the story, the atmosphere.
There's no 100% realistic games/mods. We don't talk about that. Realistics games/mods are just game/mods more realistics than others. And these can be great. Paranoia is more realistic than Monkey Strike and a lot better. And CS and DOD are more realistic than HL, so we can say they are realistics too.
Realism can improve the gameplay as the story and the athmosphere. however, if it is just an add tag, a principle, it doesn't.
It's may be what you say, but because your tips can't be longer than 10 words you are may be obliged to be a bit radical.

I couldn't agree more. A game is a "game", not a real-life simulator. You play it for fun. Of course, it's a matter of choise. Some games and mods are made that way and people play them because they love their realism and slow pace. The point here is that many, especially mod, developers think that adding ultra realism in a game/mod is the holy grail of gaming. It's not. The holy grail of gaming, if there is one, is a deep, good and well-written storyline, a good and not frustrating gameplay and of course a satisfying lenght. Things that many believe are secondary in front of the goal of making a realistic as possible mod.

And please, stop adding iron sights to everything. It does not make the game/mod realistic, it just makes it more frustrating to play.

I agree, a good game doesn't need ironsights, localised based damage and all that kind of realism stuff. You want a good example ? Portal or even the first Bioshock. Even America's Army which is supposed to be a "realistic infantry simulator" doesn't reach the 100% realism.

Furthermore, it would require like a huge amount of time to implement all the realism stuff, you want a realistic FPS ? Then :
- Remove the HUD and the crosshair
- Implement weapon jamming
- Implement realistic reload (like the first Mafia game)
- Remove the ability to save/load games
- Many more...

But if you REALLY are a realism maniac and can't make the difference between a game/reality, then take a look at this : Thedeltasix.com